Interview with a Bookstore: Biblioasis in Ontario

A independent bookshop and press in Canada, Biblioasis is run by Dan and his merry band of booksellers. They talk about what they’d add to the store if they could and why janitors and taxi drivers are better customers than academics

Biblioasis opened in its current location on Wyandotte St. E. in Windsor in 2012. An earlier incarnation of the store existed in downtown Windsor from 1998 to 2007. In the interregnum, Biblioasis operated almost exclusively as a publishing house, though it kept its fingers in the bookselling game by maintaining an online store of approximately 10,000 titles. Though its first incarnation was almost exclusively used, it now offers a balanced mix of both new, used and antiquarian titles. Dan Wells, the founding owner and publisher of both Biblioasis bookstore and Biblioasis Press, decided to open the store in part because he struggled to find a job at either his local independent bookstore — South Shore Books — or any of the area mall chains, and a volunteer stint with another bookseller amounted to little more than carpet-cleaning. With an expectation of failure at the outset, Dan is enormously grateful to have proven himself wrong.

What’s your favourite section of the store?

Dan Wells (owner/publisher): When I need a break and wander into the bookshop, I almost always find myself gravitating to one of two spots: the new arrivals tables, to see what’s recently come in, or the fiction wall. We’ve one of the best selections of literary and independently published fiction this side of Toronto, as you would expect from a bookstore associated with an independent press. And I’ve wiled away more than a few coffee breaks browsing in both places.

Tina Lyons-Hagen (bookseller): If I was asked to close my eyes and envision my ideal space for a bookstore, Biblioasis would be what I pictured: worn, creaky wood floors, exposed brick walls, and books piled precariously on shelves, floors, and tables. When you add in Loki, the resident dog, clanging cast iron pipes, the retro Bunn Pour-Omatic commercial grade coffee maker and mismatched mugs, it’s almost like a movie set.

If you had infinite space what would you add?

Bob Stewart (bookstore manager): More space for customers to hang out and read: armchairs, daybeds, window boxes, and, just for sheer aesthetics and whimsy, a spiral staircase.

Tina: Definitely more space—for customers to relax, and for creative displays. Add in an impossibly impractical wood-burning fireplace, a sparkly chandelier, and a rolling library ladder, and I may never take a day off!

Dan: Local history, poetry, philosophy, literature: all of these are the strongest sections in the store. Marrying the right book with the right reader at the right time. Learning from our customers.

Bob: I think we talk local history better than any other bookstore. And it’s not something I set out to do. I just know a lot of Windsor’s official history, and maybe even more of the unofficial history, having worked in local newspapers for 15 years prior to becoming a bookseller.

Who’s your favourite regular?

Dan: You would think it would be the university professors or lawyers or other professionals who would be our best customers: certainly, when I started out I assumed this would be the case. But it’s often been the postal workers and security guards and janitors and cab drivers who’ve proven to be the true bibliophiles, enthusiastic amateurs who read far more widely and are often much more knowledgeable than the experts.

Bob: There’s a gentleman named Abdul who came into the store on a regular basis. He appeared to be of limited means, but he was curating quite a varied collection of used, and often expensive, books on Middle Eastern and Post-War European history, political science and philosophy. We would order them in from all over the world, and very faithfully he would come in and pick them up, often bringing small treats like banana bread and juice for the booksellers. Sadly, we haven’t seen him in several months. There are special order books waiting for him on the shelf.

What’s your earliest/best memory about visiting a bookstore as a child?

Dan: The only bookstore in the town I grew up in was called Clem’s Book Exchange, a glorified junk shop with a maze of plywood shelving and books rising to the ceiling. There was no heat, at least in the back, where the floor wasn’t much more than packed earth, and the light was so dim it could have been used as a set for a slasher film. The store closed a little over two years ago, and I went back with a writer of ours who knew the store as a kid as well to pay tribute: without Clem’s, I’m virtually certain that there wouldn’t have been a Biblioasis.

Bob: G.E. Copeland Bookseller and Stationer on Lincoln Road in Windsor. It’s where I first encountered the famous bookstore scent, and where I picked out many Hardy Boys and Three Investigators books while waiting for my Mom to buy gift wrapping and ribbon and Scotch tape.

Tina: I grew up in a very small town in the Ottawa Valley. Sadly, we didn’t have a bookstore in town until I was in my teens. I faithfully made a weekly trip to the public library, and wrote my library membership number (#3329) on the cards of my chosen books. I was so very excited when the librarian waived the five book-per-week limit for me, and I was allowed to borrow as many books as I wanted.

If you weren’t running or working at a bookstore, what would you be doing?

Dan: Postal worker, perhaps. I got called for an interview at Canada Post the week I signed a lease on my first shop. Or a unemployed historian of the Scottish Enlightenment. Needless to say, I’m happy I’m neither.

What’s been the biggest surprise about running a bookstore?

Bob: Contrary to what everyone thinks, there is no time to read.

Tina: Ditto what Bob said! Also, how quick you get at figuring out what someone is asking for when they say things like “I don’t remember the title, but the author’s name starts with a K, and the cover has flowers on it.”

The staff shelf

Hag-seed by Margaret Atwood (2016): “Part of the Hogarth Shakespeare series, Hag-Seed is Margaret Atwood’s novelized re-envisioning of The Tempest as a production staged in a prison by an aggrieved artistic director, recently ousted from his position with a prominent festival.”

Rose Alley by Jeremy M Davies (2009): “One of my favourite novels of the 21st Century, it follows a film crew trying to recreate an 18th century fist fight between two famous poets against the backdrop of the student riots in Paris.”

The Road Not Taken by David Orr (2015): “No one understands Frost’s most famous poem—one of the most read and quoted works in the English language—and David Orr is on a mission to figure out why. An excellent meditation on poetry and American culture.”